Webinars for Missionaries Much More Accessible

Many of us in SEND have benefited from the webinars that have been offered on a regular basis by The Mission Exchange and CrossGlobal Link. For those unfamiliar with the vocabulary, a webinar is a short seminar (generally about an hour long) offered through the Internet.  Since missionaries are generally located thousands of kilometers from the typical places where mission training seminars, workshops and conferences are held, we have few opportunities for attending these training events.   Rarely do we have a chance to hear what missionaries and mission leaders from other organizations have learned, other than by reading a book or during our “furloughs”.  The Internet of course has changed all that, and webinars are one way where a subject matter expert can share his expertise with an audience spread across the globe.

For those who are unfamiliar with The Mission Exchange and CrossGlobal Link, they were two different evangelical mission organizations, and used be called the Evangelical Foreign Mission Association and the Interdenominational Foreign Mission Association respectively. SEND USA and SEND Canada had associate memberships in The Mission Exchange, and a full membership in CrossGlobal Link. Under that arrangement, SEND members from USA & Canada were able to watch these webinars at no cost if we watched them “live”. But in the past, downloading recordings was not free, although SEND U had purchased some of the webinars, and could distribute them within the mission.

But The Mission Exchange and CrossGlobal Link no longer exist, at least not under those names. On October 1, 2011, the memberships of these two associations agreed to merge, and form one network of more than 200 evangelical mission organizations, training centers, educational institutions and churches who send out over 35,000 missionaries to nearly every country in the world. This new network is called Missio Nexus.

With the merger of these two associations into Missio Nexus, the training resources of The Mission Exchange and CrossGlobal Link have been combined.   They advertise that they have the greatest collection of mission-related webinars in the English language, and I have no reason to doubt that claim.   SEND is a Premium Access Organization in Missio Nexus, meaning that now all of our SEND members (not just those from USA and Canada) have full access to all webinars produced by Missio Nexus.  We can also download previously recorded webinars at no cost. This is a significant benefit to those who are located in Asia, and prefer not to watch webinars at 3:00 AM!  Furthermore, our premium access status entitles us to receive book reviews and book summaries about mission topics on a regular basis. In effect, the available training resources have increased (with less duplication), have become much more accessible, can be more conveniently obtained (one website), and can be distributed more broadly.

If you or your missionary friends are members of a mission organization that has joined this network, you can take advantage of these great learning resources by personally creating a profile on the Missio Nexus website. Once you have a profile (with a login and password) on the Missio Nexus website, you can register for webinars and download recorded webinars at no charge.

By the way, here are a couple of my favorite webinars available from the Missio Nexus store:

• Overcoming Death by Email with Ted Esler, Vice President with Pioneers
• Leading from the Sandbox: Develop, Empower and Release High Impact Ministry Teams – by T.J. Addington, head of ReachGlobal